For the past few years, I've been running what has been, for most of that time, the only Commodore-run dial-up BBS anywhere in the world.  Borderline BBS has been running on a C64 in my home in southern California, and while it has never received a huge volume of calls, it has had calls from all over the world.  People have called in from places like Australia, the Netherlands, and even Israel.  I always said that I'd keep it up and running as long as people continued to call.  Well, for the past two weeks, Borderline BBS has not had a single caller.  I hate to keep equipment up and running if no one is going to use it, so I've decided to make a change.  As of today, Borderline BBS has been taken offline, indefintely.  I may bring it back online in the future if there seems to be interest, but for now, it's been taken down.

I have, however, brought a new BBS online.  It's called Cottonwood II, and it's running on Color 64 v7.36 software.  I recently discovered a way to get Color 64 v7.xx and earlier running via Telnet, so that's what I've done.  I've been testing this setup for the past couple weeks, and it's been running in place of Cottonwood BBS.  The setup is rock solid, and I've decided to run both Cottonwood BBS and Cottonwood II via Telnet simultaneously.  Cottonwood BBS, which runs on All American BBS software, is now on the standard Telnet port 23.  The "new and improved" Cottonwood II is now running on port 6400.  New users are always welcome, and I hope everyone will check out both of these BBSs. 
Here are the addresses:

Cottonwood BBS
cottonwood.servebbs.com

Cottonwood II
cottonwood.servebbs.com:6400
(use a space in lieu of the colon if you're using CGTERM)

New BBS setup photos and information have been posted on the Cottonwood Informational Website at http://cottonwood.servebbs.com

I have a very nice C128 up for auction:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110536427314

I also have many more items currently up for auction, so be sure to click the "See Other Items" link! 

Continuing my house cleaning effort... I just posted a bunch of items for auction on eBay... all items, as always, have a starting bid of 99¢.  Here is a list of the items that I currently have available which are of interest to Commodore users:

NOS Memorex 25 5.25-inch DSDD 5.25" disks

Commodore 1530 datasette - C2N cassette drive

Freeze Frame cartridge for Commodore 64

Homebrew RS-232 interface for Commodore VIC-20, 64, 128

Stranded - NEW GAME by Cronosoft for the Commodore 64!

Commodore 1750 RAM Expansion Unit w/ Servant ROM!

VICMODEM - 300 baud modem for Commodore VIC-20, 64, 128

Lot of 100 5.25-inch SSDD/DSDD 5.25" disks

Commodore 128 Power Supply

Commodore 1541-II/1581 Power Supply

Okidata Okimate 20 color printer for Commodore - IN BOX

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110529091938

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110525992610

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110525986853

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110522589757

I currently have a couple nice items up for auction on eBay:

Commodore 1570 Disk Drive, North American power conversion, with extras:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110481154885

Commodore 1581 Disk Drive with JiffyDOS installed:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110481154141

As many of you already know, I'm in the U.S. navy, and I'm currently stationed in California where I work with TV broadcasting for the military.  I've just been informed that I'll be getting sent to Afghanistan on a temporary assignment to work at the receiving end of the TV signals that we send out from here.  I'll be leaving on 7 June, and I won't be back until 14 February 2010.  As a result of this, both Cottonwood and Borderline BBSs, as well as the Cottonwood website, the ACUG website, and my personal website, will all be offline while I'm away.  I'll be shutting everything down on 5 June.  But, 8 months later, when I get back, everything will be back up and running again.  I'm very grateful for everyone's support, and I look forward to catching up on things in the "Commodore world" upon my return next year.

While I was in Washington state on vacation, there was a power outage at my house, which caused the Cottonwood/Borderline website, the ACUG website, my personal website, as well as both Cottonwood and Borderline BBSs to go offline for a few days.  Everything has been back up and running since late Monday night.

In addition, by a user request, in an effort to assist users connecting to Cottonwood BBS with a Lantronix device, I've switched from the standard Telnet port 23 to port 6400.  So, depending on what method you're using to connect to Cottonwood BBS, you'll need to either use cottonwood.servebbs.com:6400 or cottonwood.servebbs.com 6400 to connect from now on.

Rather than continuing to talk about the March meeting in the thread for the February meeting, I thought I'd go ahead and start a new thread for March. 

Robert, are there any planned topics for this meeting?

I've had a Sears SR2000 printer for a while now, but I've never used it.  I recently placed an order for new ribbons for it, and they arrived in the mail a few days ago.  Last night, I set it up, and it was working great.

And then...

I plugged it in to my C128's serial bus while the computer, drives, and printer were all on.  The error light lit up on the printer.  I turned the printer off and back on, and instead of the usual printer head back-and-forth movement, it doesn't move at all, and there's an ascending error tone.  The power light comes on, but the printer won't do anything after that tone.  Although I have heard that it's recommended to turn peripherals on in a certain order, turning everything on before the computer, I've never actually had a problem before.  Could it be that by plugging in the serial cable on the printer while everything was on somehow blew a chip inside the printer?

I'm guessing that finding another one would be easier than getting this one fixed, so if anyone has a spare one of these printers, I'd be interested in buying one.  Of course, if anyone has any idea how to fix the  one I have, I'd be willing to try anything! 

Everything that is CMD-related has been removed from my personal website at http://cottonwood.servebbs.com/wiskow .  The whole point behind my personal website has always been to make hard-to-find things available to people that can't get them anywhere else.  Since it seemed like Maurice had disappeared off the face of the earth, the CMD stuff fell into that category.  Since it appears that he's back, and he's going to be actively selling the CMD items again, then of course I don't want to get in the way of that.  Other things that I have available, like the 8250lp/SFD-1001 Technical Manual or the Blitz 128 compiler, are copyrighted as well, but if there is no viable source for people to get things like this, then I see no harm in making it available.

I hope everyone understands.

I'm looking for a collection of programs for the C128 called "The Compleat Lee O.", which was mentioned in issue 14 of C= Hacking.  It's described as a "collection of programs submitted to Loadstar to be put out on their 128 Loadstar disks. The programmer, Leo O. Clinton, tried to help fill the barren field of 80 column programming." 

The program I'm specifically looking for from that disk is called "auto expense".  If anyone knows where I can get "The Compleat Lee O." or just the program called "Auto Expense", I'd appreciate the help.  My searches on the Internet have turned up nothing, and this doesn't appear to be included in "Loadstar Compleat".

Here's a video I hadn't seen before, so I thought I'd post it in case you haven't, too. 



The Commodore Plant in West Chester, PA
The last day of this Amiga Factory. April 27, 1994. Dave Haynie shows you around of what once was...

This is listed on eBay Australia...  could be a great buy for a Commodore user "down under". 

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=250306215202

This was just posted to the cbm-hackers mailing list, and I thought some of you may be interested in it:

QuoteDate: Sat, 04 Oct 2008 01:44:37 -0700
From: Mike Naberezny
Reply-To: cbm-hackers@ling.gu.se

Hi All,

I don't think the list allows attachments so I've posted the firmware from Bil
Herd's Commodore LCD prototype here for you to download:

http://mikenaberezny.com/2008/10/04/commodore-lcd-firmware/

I just received these images and wanted to share them with you.  Even without
disassembling, the contents are very interesting.  You can see the built-in
applications and BASIC 3.6 (U103).  BASIC 3.6 looks like it has the same
Easter egg text as 3.5.

Many thanks to Bil Herd for making these available to us!

Regards,
Mike

--
Mike Naberezny  http://6502.org

Lance, the direct e-mail notification feature, which sends you an e-mail whenever a topic that you've participated in, has never worked here.  But about a week ago, it started working all of a sudden.  I just thought I'd let you and everyone else here know that it's working now.  I use this feature on most forums that I'm a member of to keep up with topics that interest me. 

Memorex 5.25" DSDD - 25 disks in original, unopened box:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110295623930

Hard plastic box for 5.25" disks - w/ 88 DSDD disks:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110295622912

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110295622233

Quote from: Blacklord on October 01, 2008, 05:57 AMMove to Australia - strong economy & the best regulated banking environment in the world

The thought has crossed my mind...  Especially after having been able to visit Perth and Sydney over the past few years thanks to the navy...  I'd really like to get to know more of the country. 

Quote from: Blacklord on October 01, 2008, 05:57 AM(And all the Vegemite you could possibly want!)

Mmmm...  Vegemite...  Yum! 

I missed Leif Bloomquist's announcement of his latest release of BBS Server on August 5th on the PETSCII Forums.  Here's a quote of his post there:

Quote from: schemaClocky's post on comp.sys.cbm finally gave me the push I needed to finish this ;-)

Changelog:

' Version 1.3    (Fixes by Eric Pearson)
'                Raise RTS on outbound connection
'                Raise DTR on outbound connection
'                Lower RTS when Call disconnects and Lower DTR when caller disconnects are preserved in INI
'
' Version 1.4    Option to force RTS always on by adding -rts to the command line.
'                Fixed bug where A/ only remembered the port a single time.
'                Option to disable +++ detection.
'                ATS0 will put BBS back on-hook.
'
' Version 1.4a   Bugfix!  Disconnect on RS232 Break only worked in Diag mode before.
'                Bugfix!  Port for Outgoing calls is now a Long (was Integer)

http://www.jammingsignal.com/files/

To further explain what "Port for Outgoing calls is now a Long (was Integer)" means...  Previously, BBS Server would only allow outgoing calls to ports up to 32767.  This wasn't a problem until Inner Circle II was set up running C-Net 128 on port 64000.  With this new version, you can now make calls to his BBS from a real Commodore computer using BBS Server 1.4a on a PC. 

--------------Forwarded---------------------
Nick (at) 64HDD
Aug 12, 10:42 am

Hi All,
I've been quietly working on a small interface to
adapt joypads and enhance their functionality
for Commodore and Atari users. Currently
support is for Sega Genesis/Megadrive and
PC analog controllers, and am finalising support
for SNES joypads. For details visit
http://www.64hdd.com/64jpx/

The enhancement modes I've included allow
you to "cheat" or enhance your experience in
a range of games such as racing, sport, platform
and blasters. I'm not so familiar with "beat'em
up" type games where you have combination
moves that may be simulated by 64JPX - any
info/help/suggestions appreciated

Whether the interface becomes a "product"
depends on interest and feedback over the
next couple weeks.

Cheers,
Nick

You may or may not know this, but I'm an enlisted member of the U.S. Navy, and I currently work at the Defense Media Center.  I'm a TV Broadcaster here - I transmit TV programs to U.S. military personnel stationed all over the world via the American Forces Network.

Anyway... We don't air regular commercials on AFN.  Instead, we have our own "military-made" spots that air in place of regular commercials.  Today, I noticed some Commodore monitors in one of these spots.  They're either 1701's or 1702's.  I uploaded a copy of the spot, which you can see here.  Pay attention about 13 seconds into the clip. 

-Andrew

Here's my desktop on my computer at work: 



For anyone else who would like a "Commodore-themed" desktop on their Windows/Linux PC or Mac, I went ahead and made screenshots of the startup screens for various Commodore computers.  They're all TIFF images.  Feel free to use any of these as you see fit:

Commodore 128 40-column
Commodore 128 80-column
Commodore 64
Commodore Plus/4
Commodore VIC-20

-Andrew

I have what may be some rare CP/M disks for the C128, which I recently uncovered hidden within the thousands of disks that I aquired from the now-defunct Civic64/128 User Group of Ventura County, California.  I don't know anything about CP/M, and I don't have the time to go through these myself, so I'd like to give the disks to someone from this forum who has the time to go through them and make anything worthwhile available to other interested users.  If interested, please send me a PM.  Thanks!

-Andrew

I've wondered for a while now if the "1541 sing" program that I've had in my disk collection since the 80's would work on a 1571.  I answered that question today.  It works!  In fact, it played louder and clearer on my 1571 than it did on my 1541!  I recorded the tune and put it up on YouTube... 
Enjoy. 



-Andrew

I just posted new photos of the setups for both Cottonwood BBS and Cottonwood II on the BBS's website at http://cottonwood.servebbs.com ...  If you want to see what a C128 setup looks like with six 1571's and four 1541's (device #'s 8 through 17), then check it out! 

-Andrew

I just saw a post on the comp.sys.cbm newsgroup with a link to this website...  It's a great resource for a wide range of utility disks, including CMD RAMLink, Turbo232, SwiftLink, Commodore REU, and so much more.  Check it out at http://www.bithunter.eu/letoltesek.htm

-Andrew

Taken from the documentation included with Ivory BBS v3.3:

I have been asked if I plan to make a version for the 128.  I do not.  Del Kayser has written a 128 BBS called PREMIER BBS which was based on 6485.  You can contact his BBS at (xxx)xxx-xxxx for more info.

I haven't been able to find any other mention of this BBS program anywhere, and it's not listed on Bo Zimmerman's BBS Programs Website.  Has anyone here ever heard of it?  I'd be interested in getting a copy, if it actually exists.

-Andrew

I discovered an interesting oddity with the 64 mode on my C128, and I'm wondering if anyone here might be able to explain what's happening.  I decided to set up a sort of "demo BBS" running Ivory BBS software so that people who are interested can see what that software is like (the address is cottonwood.servebbs.com:6400).  I initially set up the BBS on a C128 in 64 mode.  However, after having it up for a day or two, I noticed that the clock on the BBS was going haywire and not keeping correct time.  I switched the setup to run on a C64c, and the problem went away, and the BBS now keeps very accurate time.  Any ideas as to what's causing this?  Is there a method of timekeeping on a 64 that the 64 mode on a C128 doesn't support?

-Andrew

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110200748067

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110200740406

2 Available:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110199399137

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110200739738

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110200739415

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110200742915

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110200741961

I've just put a 1581 disk drive up for auction on eBay.  This drive is in pristine condition, has JiffyDOS installed, and comes in its original box.  

This is a 3-day auction with a starting bid of 99¢.  You can see the auction page here.

-Andrew

I searched everywhere I could think of for d64's of PROMOS 2.0 and PromShell v2.0, but I couldn't find d64's anywhere.  I found individual prg files from the PROMOS 2.0 disk on Ray Carlsen's website, and I found .sfx files for PromShell v2.0 on Bo Zimmerman's website.  I got them onto real disks, and I made d64's of each.  Both of these are now available for downloading as d64's on my website.  The PromShell disk is ready to go with the required PROMOS 2.0 file already added to it.  Also, for historical value, I also put a d64 of PROMOS 1.1 on my site as well (I couldn't find that anywhere in any form).  Enjoy.  

-Andrew

I have put my Lt Kernal hard drive up for auction on eBay.  This is in excellent working condition, and it comes with the 128 daughterboard required to connect to a C128!

This is a TRUE auction, with a starting bid of only 99¢!  No reserve!  No Buy-It-Now!  No high starting bid!



Check out the auction page here.

-Andrew

Since there is no website currently dedicated to all the great PETSCII Art that was common on Commodore BBS's, I'm thinking about starting one up.  However, I currently only have three disks of PETSCII Art files, so I'm looking to increase this collection before starting a website.  If anyone has any disks of PETSCII Art, either self-made or buffer captures from BBS's, I'd be interested in getting copies. Please contact me here, or send me an e-mail at wiskow@verizon.net. Thanks!

-Andrew

I just found a page that I'd never seen before with some C128 Communications files.  Maybe you guys have seen it before, or maybe not.  Anyway, here it is:

http://cerealport.homeip.net/cereal/8-MODEM/filesbbs.html

-Andrew

I just put several nice items up for auction on eBay, including an SX-64, a VIC-1011A RS-232 Interface, 1541 replacement parts, sealed 5.25" disks, PLA chips, a SID chip, and more!  See everything I currently have up for auction here.

-Andrew

I've got a very nice 1571 up for auction on eBay right now...  See the auction page here.

I've also got several other nice items up for auction right now...  See everything I'm currently offering here.

-Andrew

I recently picked up a Commodore DPS-1101 printer in great condition.  It's my first daisywheel printer, and I've got lots of spare ribbons and spare wheels with different fonts, too.  

What I'm wondering is, can a daisywheel printer be used with GEOS128?  And if so, does anyone have any suggestions as to which printer driver to use?  I know that this printer can only do straight text, so no fancy GEOS fonts will be available.  But if I can use GeoWrite128 to print straight text files, I'd like to know how.  The only printer I've ever used previously was a Star SL-10C, and I used the Comm. Compat. printer driver for that one.

-Andrew

I'm not sure how many 1571 clones there were, but I've never seen one in person...  There's one up on eBay right now:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=300167832361

-Andrew

I've finally managed to figure out how to serve out files from my own PC at home, so I've now made the Hi Res scan of the CMD HD manual available on my personal website.  Enjoy!  

-Andrew

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=110179601780

I have a 1541-II disk drive up for auction in pristine, like new condition.  And best of all, it's one of the direct-driven Chinon models, which is considered to be the best, most reliable variety of 1541 drive that Commodore ever manufactured.  It comes in its original box, with everything inside as if you had bought it from a computer store in the 80's!

See the auction here:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110179600409

-Andrew

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=110174323144